Israeli-born Gilad Atzmon, who has made a career out of condemning
Israel and rejecting his Jewish roots, fully identifying with and
promoting the Arab position on the illegitimacy of Israel and
Zionism, and affirming the most egregious of anti-Semitic
allegations, has been rejected by the Arabs for whom he advocates. In
a letter published by the PA´s Ma´an news agency Thursday, a long
list of PA activists, professors, writers, and advocates from around
the world said that they “disavowed” Atzmon, noting “the dangers of
supporting Atzmon’s political work and writings and providing any
platform for their dissemination.”

Atzmon, who is considered one of Britain´s most accomplished jazz
musicians, was born in Israel and served in the IDF during the war in
Lebanon in 1982. Afterwards, he emigrated to Britain, where he
started performing and building his jazz career, while at the same
time speaking and writing about what he calls Israel´s “theft of
Palestine” from the Arabs, “Jewish supremacy and racism,” and “use of
the Holocaust to justify the occupation.” He has endorsed the
Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and in 2005 wrote that “American
Jews do control the world, by proxy. So far they are doing pretty
well for themselves at least.”

Atzmon´s political work, which includes hundreds of essays published
around the world, as well as several books, has been lauded by, among
others, Richard Falk, James Petras, and John Mearsheimer, all of whom
have been highly critical of Israel and Zionism, to say the least.
Mearsheimer, who with Stephen Walt wrote a 2007 book “exposing” the
Israel lobby, endorsed Atzmon´s 2011 book “The Wandering Who,” but
later issued a statement qualifying that endorsement, over comments
Atzmon made in the book that the Jews “persecuted” Hitler
and “traffic in body parts.” Responding to criticism of him for
endorsing what many in the anti-Zionist activist community called
anti-Semitism, Mearsheimer wrote that although the book was filled
with “interesting insights, but I do not agree with everything that
he says in the book.”

Central to Atzmon´s thesis is rejection of his Judaism, from which
Zionism derives its strength. To be Jewish, Atzmon claims, is to be
Zionist, and one who wishes to support the Palestinian cause must
deny their Jewish heritage. It is this position that the PA
intellectuals reject, and in a letter issued Wednesday, they told
Atzmon that his help for their cause was not needed, or wanted.

"We reaffirm that there is no room in this historic and foundational
analysis of our struggle for any attacks on our Jewish allies, Jews,
or Judaism; nor denying the Holocaust; nor allying in any way shape
or form with any conspiracy theories, far-right, orientalist, and
racist arguments, associations and entities,” the letter
says. “Zionism, to Atzmon, is not a settler-colonial project, but a
trans-historical ´Jewish´ one, part and parcel of defining one’s self
as a Jew. Therefore, he claims, one cannot self-describe as a Jew and
also do work in solidarity with Palestine, because to identify as a
Jew is to be a Zionist. We could not disagree more.

“Challenging Zionism, including the illegitimate power of
institutions that support the oppression of Palestinians, and the
illegitimate use of Jewish identities to protect and legitimize
oppression, must never become an attack on Jewish identities, nor the
demeaning and denial of Jewish histories in all their diversity,” the
letter adds.